Introduction

The Draft International Standard (DIS) has been approved to progress to final draft once the comments received have been addressed at the Berlin meeting in early June, 2018. The anticipated publication of the standard is in December 2018/January 2019.

The aim of this project is to develop a new standard on Monetary valuation of environmental impacts and related environmental aspects. The work was initiated in September 2015 following a successful ballot of SC1 members.

Intent of work

The area of monetary valuation of environmental impacts and natural resources is huge and complex. The standard will not prescribe a step-by-step instruction of a monetary valuation, rather it will provide organizations a common framework including established methods as well as common terms within the field of monetary valuations. Although the deliverable will be a requirement standard, in accordance with ISO's neutrality principle, it does not mean that it will be used for the purpose of conformity assessment. The framework will ensure a higher degree of transparency regarding the numbers and how impacts and aspects have been valued in monetary terms as requirements relate to documentation and justification of methods chosen.

The rationale for ISO to engage in this area is that there is already a strong trend in monetary assessments by government (i.e. the polluter pays principle), private sector (in reporting, risk assessment etc.) and academia. ISO can bring much needed transparency and a common language to this work. Several other important initiatives exist in the field and will be invited to join the work. However, ISO has a unique platform in engaging a broad range of stakeholders and countries which will bring an added benefit to other initiatives.

Still, as this is a fairly new area within ISO, embarking on such a project requires a larger diversity of experts such as economists and experts not presently engaged in TC 207. Likewise, it requires experts from other sub-committees within TC 207 and from external Liaison organizations.

Timeline

The aim is for the standard to be published in December 2018/January 2019.

Frequently Asked Questions and their answers in relation to ISO 14008 can be found here as a PDF and will be added to as applicable

Possible future developments

The above new work does not set out how an organization determines the specific ‘cost and benefits’ associated with its organizational operation in an Environmental Management context, nor clarify why and how monetary valuation can be used and communicated as part of an existing environmental management approach or system. It is expected that these aspects could be covered in future standards within the Environmental Management System family, should such be proposed. The feasibility of such additional standardization in a wider Environmental Management System context has been highlighted during the preparation of the new work proposal.

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